Walking with Suits

I always enjoy walking. The last few days, I have been walking in Ottawa, our capital city. Walking in Ottawa is always an "experience." In Ottawa, there are many suits. My daughter lives just a few blocks from the Prime Minister's residence, although not on Sussex Drive.[Before I leave, I plan to stoll past the Official Residence and give it the Finger. That's all the Greeting I need to give!

So far, I have asked to two grandsons, and one old friend. I have spent two lovely afternoons reading in the Planet Cafe, watching all the students share their lives with one another. I walked home thy afternoon through an area full of drugged out folks and dealers, definitely NOT the suit zone! Plans are afoot to visit the National Gallery of Art, and the House of Commons.I'm steeling myself for this latter, as I expect the question period to be like a gathering of grade six boys on a lay ground, shouting insults at each other. If he children of tese elected officials behaved tis way, they would be housed for days!

Having lived in this city Twenty years ago, I remember that beneath the veneer of government and bureaucracy, this is rally an old sawmill town, built on a swamp, which accounts forthe terriblehu humidity. In the summer, the atmosphere is stifling, not ulimesome of the government bureaucracy.

spending time with Jennifer and her partner Jose is very pleasant, and just what I was hoping for.We will attend the gallery together, and eat it n Jennfer's birthday on May 11. This is a great vacation for me!

Since arriving,I have been reading Jan Wong's memoir, Out of The Blue. This book chronicles her descent into a deep depression, precipitated by the violent response to her account of the Dawson College shooting, some years ago. Not only was the public response from Quebecers violent, but her employer, the revered Globe and Mail newspaper, refused to to support her, but n the end, fired her. In the book, she is very open about her own r ratio. Ad very candid about the paper's shoddy treatment of her. In the process of preparing this book - which she had t publish herself, as the toronto establishment circled the wagons to shut her out - she researched the topic of depression very thoroughly. As a a result, this is one f the best books on depression that I have ever read. I will be sharing it with you over the next few weeks. To check it out for yourself, go to www.janwong.ca. More n this anon. right now, I deed a nap.

With a voice of singing

Neither of my parents were musical in any way, so I grew up with almost no music in my life. An exception was our daily listening to The Happy Gang, a noon hour CBC program starring Bert Pearl, Eddie Allen, Blaine Mathe and Bobby Gimby. Lots of jumping music there!

Music came into my life with my first wife, Joan. From a very musical family, Joan introduced me to the classics, to opera, and to fine music generally. It was one of the many gifts she brought to our relationship. As a result of this gain in my experience, I came to experience fine music as 'soul food.'

Last evening, Beatrix and I travelled to Stettler, Alberta - a one hour drive - to hear and see the University of Alberta Mixed Chorus and Hand bell Choir perform. Although the gathering of University students seemed large to me, only about half the chorus was there because of summer jobs, studying, etc. They sang religious music, classics, show tunes,  a folk song, and the U of A's official song.

As I say and let these beautiful sounds wash over me, I became aware of how long it has been since I heard and experienced good choral music. I also became aware of how much I miss this experience, and how much I felt 'fed' by these young people and their joyous and profound singing.

Of course, I couldn't help but reflect on the way music contributes to the soul-satisfaction of the worship experience, and how arid worship can be without the contribution of good music, especially choral music. The human voice is an instrument, and we use it far too often to argue, persuade, disagree and complain, and not often enough to lift the spirit with melody and expression.

I came away from the evening with a resolve to seek out and experience good choral music whenever and wherever I can. Too much of the music that surrounds my rural community is trite, homey, and rhythmic. Nothing wrong with any of it, it simply doesn't touch my soul the way it seems to touch many other people. Clearly, if I want the experience I crave, I will have to seek it out and go to it; it isn't likely to come to me where I am. Of course, I can turn to the many CDs of choral music that are in my home. Not the same as watching the bliss on young faces as they meld together in song, but much better than nothing at all. My message to day - for myself, if for no one else - is "seek and you shall find" the choirs, the choral groups, the voices, that I need to nourish and enrich my internal soul experience.

A Committed Life

I’ve been reading A Thousand Farewells by Nalah Ayed. Well, reading is the wrong word. I’ve been immersed in it. This memoir of her years as a Tele-journalist for the CBC in the Middle East is both riveting and devouring. Ms. Ayed was 32 when she is dropped into Iraq, just before “Bush’s War” (the Iraqi term for it) begins. She is new, untested, and incredibly courageous. She learns her craft amid falling shells and social chaos. The writing is so intense that one becomes tied in knots following her through the horrific scenes that make up life in Iraq and Lebanon.

Nalah Ayed was born in Winnipeg of Palestinian parents, raised in St. Boniface until the age of seven. At that point, her family returned to a refugee camp in Jordan, where all their family lived. This place was “home” for displaced Palestinians. There she lived until the age of thirteen, when her family returned to Winnipeg, where she completed her education and joined the CBC. Being an Arab-speaker was one of the gifts Ms. Ayed brings to investigation and reporting. The story of her almost-decade long life among the victims of a Western war is illuminating and heart-rending.

I came away from this experience with two overwhelming feelings. The first relates to Nalah herself. How traumatized is she from the last years of her relatively young life? How long will it take her to recover from that experience? The parent in me wants to surround her with a safe place and lots of care, so she can heal.

The second feeling that floods me is the awareness that we – that I – know nothing about hardship and disruption, no matter how difficult my – your – life is, it couldn’t possibly match the day-to-day struggle of the Middle Eastern person overwhelmed with war and chaos.

Lifting my eyes from Ayed’s writing, I find myself looking around me a normal North American life, and think: “This is heaven compared with how the Middle Eastern world lives. And we – the western world – are major contributors to their corporate life of misery.”

At this point, I have no idea how to respond to this book, apart from feeling awe at this woman’s courage and ability, and at the cost she has paid to keep us informed of what is happening in Iraq, in Lebanon, and Egypt. She has been there in the midst of war, and revolution, and utter desolation, making it possible – making it necessary – for us to become aware of that world, in which our nation is involved.

Ms. Ayed has given her youth to sharing this chaotic world with the West, and is only now beginning to live her life in our world, trying to re-enter a life she stepped away from to become a set of eyes on chaos.

It is at once heartening and sobering to realize that there are young professionals eager and willing to risk their lives to share fact and truth with a world increasingly confused by “spin.” I celebrate this woman’s career, and wish peace and happiness in the rest of her life.

Regrets

Watched another interesting Martin Sheen movie the other night: Stella Days. The story revolves around an older Irish priest, banished to a cold and dark and conservative village because he complained about his treatment while scholar in Rome. As with most Martin Sheen's movies, it is not only interesting, but pushes the viewer to reflect on a major…or poignant…life issue. In this case, it has to do with regrets. Father Barry has a number of regrets, among them, speaking out and thus being the cause of his 'demotion' to rural Ireland. He longs to finish his thesis in lordly Rome.

That got me thinking about regrets in my own life, and the role played by 'paths not taken' along the way. As one moves deeper into the seventies of life, one's perspective on those oaths gets clearer  in the distance. I regret, for example, moving directly from school to University, and from University to Seminary. I wish, in retrospect, that I'd the foresight and courage to step away and go somewhere else for an experience. That possibility struck me most forcibly in 2001 when we were in Turkey. I loved Turkey - Istanbul and the Ilhara valley in Cappodocia particularly. What a different experience that would bee for a 20 year old! How would that have changed my life? Just getting there would have changed my life! To become the person who would make that break would have made me a totally different person.

I regret not moving back to the north as a minister when I was a bit more mature than in 1959m at 26. Of course it would have been much more difficult with a family, and with a spouse who was so totally tied to "home" in Winnipeg. Not that I was much different. Moving to Alberta seemed like a Great Leap to me!

Leaving my first marriage was a very hard choice, but I have no regrets about that choice. I have regrets about some of the consequences of that choice. The impact on my children is one area where i have regrets. They suffered, and I suffer now from that suffering. But the initial choice? I had to do it, after months of struggle. The cost of remaining would have been too costly for me, personally. 

I regret that I didn't 'break the rules' more often as an adolescent. I mean the BIG rules. I was such a straight-line-walker. I have a hunch that at least some of that comes from being an 'only' child, and thus dependent for approval only on parents - and only on one parent, for the six years of the war when my father was away. Looking back, and reflecting on the lives my own kids, I can see that I felt 'without support' when it came to choices. I really don't don't know if that support was any help to my kids in making choices, and most of the time, they appeared to be straight-line-walkers as well. I guess I just don't know…but I imagine. I am now much more intentional about choices, although, to be fair, the choices are not very radical or costly. I say what I think more often, and I write what I think very often. I am clearly not done with this line of thought. "More anon", as Grandma Black used to say…

Post election thoughts

It's five days since our Provincial election took place, and the repercussions and dissections have been going on ever since. The failure of local and national polls to accurately tell what was going to happen is notable, especially since a number of middle and high school mock votes were much closer to the reality than were the polls. It seems the children were listening quite carefully to their parents adult discussions of things to come, electorally speaking. Perhaps next time, the polling might be done among the children of Alberta, who appeared to have their ear closer to the ground than did the pollsters.

Much of the media commentary, and some of my own thinking, has been focused on the values expressed in this election and its results. Let's begin with brand loyalty, for example, There were members of the Federal Conservative machine who surreptitiously - and some openly - supported and aided the Wildrose Party, while the provincial Progressive Conservatives received far less encouragement from the Ottawa big C's, being slightly too progressive for the big guns down east. It will be interesting to see how smoothly Herr Harper works with Alison Redford, our Premier, and a PC.

It was clear that a large chunk of the Wildrose vote emanated from disaffected Tories, who felt that conservative principles and practices have been betrayed over the years by the PCs. Many of these are young farm families, with clear conservative views on everything from same-sex issues to gun control, to public fiscal morality. Actions of the part of the ruling PCs had enraged than over the last four or five years. Chief among the offending acts was the decisions made, and the Bills passed, which effectively gutted the farmers land right over their own property. These measures gave the government the right to walk over any farmer regarding the use of his land for power lines, for example, even denying that farmer the right to court action to hold up the "expropriation."

The Wildrose party would repeal those Bills. So, of course, would every other non-government party. What the PCs will do with those Bills on the books now is anybody's guess. Further use of them will virtually guarantee a landslide of votes against them in the next Provincial election. Other actions also screamed  moral and ethical foul as the campaign progress. The Premier's awkward and slow move to bring to heel the members of her caucus who wanted to keep their ill-gotten gains - up to $36000+ - for sitting on a committee that hadn't met for three and half years was one bad step on the Conservative side. The refusal of Danielle Smith to muzzle or even chastise a pair of Wildrose candidates who stepped clearly over the moral line. One said that he could apply the law fairly, even though he believed that gay people would burn eternally in a lake of fire. The other smugly announced that he was clearly the candidate best equipped  to represent his constituents because he was Caucasian, whereas they (one a brown Muslim, the other a brown Sikh) could only speak for "their communities." Smith drove another nail part-way into her own coffin by publicly questioning the validity of climate change science, say that "the jury is still out" on that issue!

The moral and ethical validity of Alberta election campaigns can't be fully assessed unless one factors in the impact and influence of Big Oil. The province runs on oil, and many people believe that the province is run by Big Oil. Attitudes are shaped by how matters effect the oil industry. Anyone who vigorously opposed the fossil fuel giants - such as Wiebo Ludwig - is branded a radical and a terrorist, and gotten rid of, without compunction. The economy of the province is so dependent on oil production that even the most left-wing of parties must tread very carefully as regards energy  and environmental policy, lest they threaten the hefty six figure salaries of many oil workers. There is probably no place in Canada where a man with minimal education can pull down such a good wage. Of course, many oilfield workers are highly educated in their areas of special expertise, while being relatively uneducated as regards the human side of life.

The PCs, with their commanding majority, can pretty much do what they want in the Legislature, due to meet again before summer ( a break with the past where Alberta Legislatures met for fewer days than virtually any other provincial legislative body), and they must tread carefully. The Wildrose minority and their illustrated supporters are ready to scream and stomp if too much is pushed on them. As the Chinese proverb says, "My you live in interesting times." Here in Alberta, we do!

Exit Poll

Election Day has come and gone in Alberta. It looked, as the vote count began, as though it might be a disaster, with the extreme right wing party - Wildrose - winning a majority of seats. In the end, however, the Progressive Conservatives - right wing, but more centrist - pulled off a strong majority. So Alberta continues to have a Conservative government, 41 consecutive years and counting.

Asa life long New Democrat, I never believed I would say this: I'm relieved that the PCs won a majority. I was actually hoping for a minority, so the Progressive parties (ND, Liberal and Alberta Parties) might have more clout in the House. However, a raucous (though small - 17) Wildrose opposition will keep salient issues on the front page of most papers. The PCs know that if they fail to meet the expectations of the significant numbers of Wildrose supporters, in the next election - four years away - they will be swept away for sure. The Wildrose rural people are not shy about speaking out, and I suspect that they will call a spade a spade over the next two or three years. The PCs may well have to amend some of their bills or they will be setting themselves up for a tumble next time around. 

The Wildrose were born out of a rural concern for the draconian land use bills the PCs were pushing through the House. The impact of these bills meant that land could be expropriated and/or used, for power lines, oil leases, etc without the landowner having to be consulted. The final bill, "Bill 50," even barred landowners from access to the courts to slow the process down. During the election campaign, every party except the PCs vowed to repeal these laws. It remains to be seen how the PCs will use their majority on this issue. The Wildrose elected two or three people who are expert on this issue and who will make their lives hell in the Legislature. I hope!

Once again I experienced the desperate moves made by TV media to keep people watching their channel as results come in. With only a few polls counted, some stations declare a candidate elected! CTV was way out in front on this activity. I suspect this is done to keep people watching during the hour or two before there are any meaningful results, when one candidate surges ahead and then falls back. It seems uncanny that they are so often on the mark with that process. We had CTV on one set, and CBC on the other. CBC was careful to say that they were waiting for more conclusive results before declaring. On the one hand, I think it's presumptuous that the networks leap ahead with their predictions. On the other hand, they want to keep us engaged, and this in one way to do it.

We watched the results with our candidate and his supporters and family, so we heard some juicy political gossip during the evening. It was our first experience of watching results in this way. I'd do it again; it gives one a sense of solidarity with like-minded people at a tense moment in time.

My fault

In my current reading, I have run across some information about bullying. Some psychiatrists maintain that even one experience in childhood of public humiliation can have the same impact on a young person as a whole history of being bullied. This struck me as a bit grandiose, until I began mining my own childhood with a view to discovering if there was any clue as to the origins of my tendency to feel guilty in any situation where something negative happens. It's like, "It must be my fault." I have been repeatedly puzzled by this internal reaction, which has occurred over and over in my adult life.

As I "remembered back" into my childhood, I landed upon one experience I had when I was 11, perhaps 12 years old. It happened at the Pirates skating rink in my home town. It was the one time in my childhood when I tried playing on a hockey team. Remember, this is 1944 or so - a long time ago.

It was on an outdoor rink, the only kind we had in those days. I was on a team, but none of us had any equipment; not pads, nor Jerseys, nor helmets (helmets? In 1944?). We had skates and sticks. And a puck. I had been sent out on the ice to play right wing, although I shot left handed. The play was underway, when our coach, standing atop the snow piled outside the boards, began screaming at me to get off the ice. I didn't understand, sia\ the screaming got louder and more angry. I had no idea what I had done, or why he was sounding so angry, but finally I scuttled to the boards and climbed off the ice. It seemed like everyone standing along the boards was watching me. I felt totally GUILTY; but I had no idea why, or what I had done or not done. What I did was rush into the clubhouse, an old boxcar with a Quebec heater at one end, peel off my skates and race home. I never went back to the team, although I skated at the Pirates most week nights. The coach didn't look for me to explain, and I never played a single moment of hockey again in my life. To this day, when there is a problem happening in my vicinity, that same feeling washes over me: humiliation, and "What did I do? It must be my fault."

I can find no other childhood experience in my long-term memory bank - the one 'bank' that seems intact - that contains such a memory. I stand in awe that such a small and trivial experience has had such an impact on my internal life. I can only imagine what it must be like a child who is humiliated again and again. Psychological bullying, I suppose one might call it, if it became a regular experience. Wow! What an impact that would have.

I don't consider myself to have been bullied often. Now and then for sure, by 'big kids' in the neighborhood. It was then that I wished for an older sibling to stand up for me. It was then that I experienced being alone in that special way that only children have of being in the world. I never spoke of these periodic experiences at home. This is actually the very first time I have ever expressed them in any way during my whole life. I can feel that exquisite discomfort - pain? - even now as I write.  I wonder how many others might have this kind of memory…